This invention relates generally to the field of garment design, and more particularly, to an improved method for obtaining one or plural designs using a number of drawing steps and associated research.
Particularly in the field of women's apparel, it is common for an apparel designer to design as many as thirty or more garments, during the course of a single day, from which an executive designer, stylist, marketing representative, manager or buyer will select possibly two or three designs. Such selections are necessarily based upon subjective considerations, and, accordingly, within reasonable limits, the greater number of designs from which to select, the greater is the likelihood of obtaining a satisfactory design or designs.
It is known in the art to provide work books in which pages are devoted to individual components of garments, such as collars, sleeves, skirts, bodices, and the like. The designer uses such books by starting with a sheet of tracing paper upon which a fashion figure has been printed. Next, a series of garment components are selected, and with each selection, the tracing paper is oriented by placing it upon the sketch of the desired component, and lining up the head and shoulders of the figure, such that the desired printed sketch can be traced in proper relative position. This procedure is continued until all of the required garment components have been selected and traced upon the figure. After examination of the completed drawing, component changes may be made by tracing all of the components except those where change is desired, or by erasing a component from an existing drawing, following which a new tracing of the desired component or part, using a different sketch from the work book, is made.
Using such techniques, an adequate representation of a drawing can be completed within a ten to fifteen minute period. However, repeating the process with successive designs is tedious, and, very often, the successive designs composed as a repeated process are very similar. In such process, a number of complete designs are discarded by the designer herself, with a corresponding waste or loss of design time. Often the substitution of a single element constitutes the entire difference between successive designs, and each entire design must nevertheless be fully completed to provide a basis for visual comparison. This is especially necessary where the final decision is not made by a designer, but by a person who often lacks the capability for high structural visualization.
It is known in the art to provide a computer based system in which representations of entire garment styles are stored and presented to a customer for sales purposes, with an opportunity for the customer or wearer to modify the design within predetermined limits with regard to their measurements. However, such system does not contemplate the actual design of a garment, but merely certain modifications to patterns used in manufacturing.
In using such a system, an existing style or pattern is initially selected by the customer from a catalog, and a catalog or identification number is inserted into the system to retrieve the finished pattern from a data bank. Such system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,149,246 granted to Robert N. Goldman, April 10, 1979. Such system, however, does not permit actual design of a garment, but merely the modification of a previously created pattern. It is specifically used to custom tailor a pattern to the measurements of a client.